비상장기업에 대한 외부감사가 재량적 발생액에 미치는 효과
The Effect of an External Audit for Private Firms on Discretionary Accruals
박종일(충북대학교); 전규안(숭실대학교)
43권 4호, 1257~1285쪽
초록
본 연구는 비상장기업을 대상으로 외부감사가 기업의 회계투명성을 개선시키는지를 알아보기 위하여 기업의 재량적 발생액과의 관계를 통해 살펴보았다. 구체적으로는 외부감사를 받지 않은 기업과 외부감사를 받은 기업 간의 재량적 발생액수준에 차이가 있는지를 검증하였다. 만일 비상장기업에서 외부감사의 효과가 있다면 회계정보의 질이 개선되어 외부감사를받은 기업들의 이익조정 수준이 감소될 것으로 예상된다. 이를 위하여 재량적 발생액의 추정은 Dechow et al.(1995)과Kothari et al.(2005)의 방법에 따라 성과미대응과 성과대응 측정치를 병행하여 분석했다. 분석기간은 1999년부터2007년까지 9년간이며, 상장되지 않은 기업 중 금융업을 제외하고 분석에 이용한 최종표본은 55,703개 기업/연 자료이다. 이중 감사미필 기업이 3,348개 기업/연, 감사필 기업이 52,355개 기업/연 자료이다. 실증결과는 다음과 같다. 첫째, 재량적 발생액에 영향을 미칠 수 있는 일정 변수를 통제한 후에도 비상장기업에서 외부감사를 받지 않은 기업(감사미필 기업)은 받은 기업(감사필 기업)에 비해 재량적 발생액이 1% 수준에서 유의하게 더 높은것으로 나타났다. 둘째, 감사필 기업에 대하여 감사인 유형에 따라 Big 4, non-Big 4 및 감사반으로 나눈 후 감사받은기업과 감사미필 기업 간의 재량적 발생액을 비교한 결과에 따르면, 감사인 유형에 상관없이 감사미필 기업이 감사필 기업보다 재량적 발생액이 모두 1% 수준에서 유의하게 높은 것으로 나타났다. 이러한 결과는 이익조정 측정치를 성과조정여부로 측정한 것과 관계없이 일관되게 나타났으며, OLS의 검증결과뿐만 아니라 이분산성 및 횡단면-시계열적 종속성문제가 조정된 t 값을 제공하는 Newey and West(1987) 검증결과 또는 군집성을 통제한 Clustering 검증결과에서도일치된 결과로 나타나 본 연구결과는 강건성을 가지고 있는 것으로 나타났다. 이상의 결과를 종합하면, 외부감사를 받지 않은 기업들은 외부감사를 받은 기업들에 비해 전반적으로 발생액을 통한 이익조정 수준이 더 높게 나타났다. 본 연구의 결과는 비상장기업에서 외부감사의 필요성을 보여준 결과라는 점에서 정책입안자들에게 비상장기업에서의 외부감사의 범위 결정 문제와 관련한 중요한 시사점을 제공해 줄 것으로 기대된다.
Abstract
This paper examines the effect of external audit on accounting transparency using privatefirms. We use discretionary accruals as the proxy of accounting transparency. We furtherinvestigate a differential effect of external audit depending on auditor type. Although the effectof external audit has been investigated in many previous papers, most articles has focused onlisted companies or initial external audit for private firms. The previous papers which examine the effect of external audit for private firms mainlyexamine the relation between external audit and interest rates on their debt and the relationbetween external audit and earnings management. The previous papers that examine therelation between external audit and interest rates on their debt find that private companieswith audits pay significantly lower interest rates on their debt than private companies with noaudit. The previous papers which examine the relation between external audit and earningsmanagement has focused on initial audit. The previous papers on initial external audit forprivate firms proposed mixed results. In this paper, we examine the effect of external audit forprivate firms by comparing discretionary accruals between firms with audited by externalauditors and firms with no audit. The Korean environment provides a useful setting in which to examine the effect of an externalaudit. In Korea, the no-audit base case is available for private firms. The private Koreancompanies with total assets of less than 10 billion Korean won are not required to have theirfinancial statements audited by independent auditors. As a result, we observe two distinctgroups of private firms: firms with no audit and firms with audited by auditors. Using this unique setting, we aim to provide systematic evidence on the effect of an external audit per sein earnings management. Using 55,703 firm-year observations (3,348 firm-year observations with no audit and 52,355firm-year observations with audit) from 1999 and 2007 in private firms with audited byexternal auditors and firms with no audit, we test the effect of external audit. We measure twoproxies for audit quality: discretionary accruals measures using Dechow et al. (1995) (modifiedJones’ Model, no-performance-matched discretionary accruals) and performance-matcheddiscretionary accruals in Kothari et al. (2005). The results of this paper are following. First, when we use the two proxies of audit quality,controlling for other factors, discretionary accruals of firms with no audit is higher than that offirms with audited by external auditors. These results are still hold even after appling Neweyand West (1987) test and Clustering test and this suggests that our results are robust. Thisfinding suggests that on average, firms that receive a external audit for private firms experiencelittle earnings managements. This implies that there is the effect of external audit for privatefirms. Second, when we test the effect of auditor type, controlling for other factors, regardlessof auditor type discretionary accruals of firms with no audit is higher than that of firms withaudited by external auditors. This implies that the main factor of audit effect for private firmsis not auditor type but audit per se. Auditor type consists of Big 4 auditor, non-Big 4 auditorand a group of practitioners. A group of practitioners is comprised of more than 3 CPAs for providingaudit services in accordance with the Act on External Audit of Stock Companies. A group ofpractitioners can audit KOSDAQ firms and private firms but can’t audit KOSPI firms. So, when weexamine the effect of external audit for private firms, considering auditor type is interesting. We contribute to the literature in several other ways. Until now, there aren’t researches testingaudit effect on non-listed companies. Previous papers examine the effect of initial externalaudit on the earnings management using private firms. But this paper examines the effect ofexternal audit for private firms. The results of this paper imply that the external audit forprivate firms is important for decreasing earnings management. Academics can also apply thediscussion in this paper for related researches. Korea reduces the scope of external audit byamending Enforcement Decree of the Act on External Audit of Stock Companies in 2009. Theresults of this paper imply that accounting transparency for private firms can be decreasedfrom this amending.
- 발행기관:
- 한국경영학회
- 분류:
- 경영학